Published 5:30 am, Monday, July 4, 2011

Parking lifts can be used for cars at the Union Bar and Lounge, but they're on hold in other areas for now.

Parking lifts can be used for cars at the Union Bar and Lounge, but they're on hold in other areas for now.

Photo: Alan Warren, Chronicle

Bars double up on parking, prompting safety fears

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The chances of getting a good parking spot at some Houston bars are starting to look up.

Yet the hydraulic parking lifts that a few Houston establishments installed to lessen their parking woes made city leaders so nervous that they've placed a moratorium on further lifts, which allow one car to be raised so that a second vehicle can be parked underneath.

District D Councilwoman Wanda Adams, who represents Midtown, attached an amendment to the city budget passed last month that requires the planning department to craft an ordinance in the next three months to regulate lifts.

"When I saw the parking lifts, I was like, 'Whoa! Do we have standards for these?' " Adams said. She's concerned about the safety of the lifts, which she says don't look like they can hold much.

The devices have been in use at bars and restaurants in other parts of the country for decades, but there's only about 25 of them registered at Houston's Planning Department. (Nine of them were at a now-closed bar on Washington Avenue.

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Union Bar on Bagby Street in Midtown and H Town Bar & Grill on Washington Avenue are among the venues stacking cars in portions of their parking lots.

A neighbor of Union Bar said he is concerned that the devices could drop a car, perhaps even throw a spark that could start a fire. His home is just yards away from some of the Union Bar lifts.

"We're talking about lifting a car that potentially has a full tank of gas," Carlos Solis said. A manual from the company that Solis says manufactures the bar's lifts states that the devices should not be installed outdoors, as they are at Union Bar.

The bar owners could not be reached for comment.

'A no-brainer' to use

Sy Zuckerman, an 80-year-old parking lift sales representative at Denver-based Harding Steel, said safety should not be an issue with proper parking lifts.

Zuckerman said he does not know if the lifts at the Houston bars are Harding lifts, but said the lifts he has at condominium complexes are so easy to operate that residents use them on a self-serve basis after five minutes of training.

"It's a no-brainer to operate the machines," said Zuckerman, adding that he doesn't know of a single claim filed against the company's liability insurance in its 43-year history.

For commercial establishments, he recommends that valets operate the lifts for logistical reasons. Somebody needs to hold the keys in case the bottom car has to be moved to offload the top car.

Adams' amendment calls for an ordinance that includes design and installation standards for lifts. The amendment, which was attached to a budget that reduced spending from last year's budget by $100 million, also calls for permitting fees.